


you can stay in the barn.

by wanderwithme (wanderlustt)



Category: God of War (Video Games)
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Smut, KRATOS LEARNS HOW TO COURT A LADY, No Spoilers, Romance, i will die on this hill, inn-keeper fluff, kratos deserves happiness, post-game content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-08
Updated: 2020-10-08
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:34:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26902213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wanderlustt/pseuds/wanderwithme
Summary: It begins when the words “you can stay in the barn” escape your tired lips before you even digest the fact that the two travelers who’ve no doubt just returned from some nefarious journey in the mines are looking very much blood-stained, broken, and in dire need of care. You’ve taken to calling them Big Man and Small Boy because you don’t learn their names, you don’t learn where they’re from, and you don’t learn what they’re after, which is fine by you because—well—you have a feeling.Yes, a feeling.(Five times Kratos meets the inn-keeper's daughter and decides, for once, that maybe he deserves the small joys in life too.)
Relationships: Kratos (God of War)/Reader
Comments: 8
Kudos: 88





	you can stay in the barn.

**Author's Note:**

> pretty sure there's like 11 god of war reader fics but i dont care i am writing this for pure self-indulgence kratos HMU MY DMs are WIDE OPEN SIR

1.

Like most legends of old, it begins in a barn, specifically a barn doubling as an inn—and that inn doubling as a beacon of light for weary travelers.

It begins when the words “you can stay in the barn” escape your tired lips before you even digest the fact that the two travelers who’ve no doubt just returned from some nefarious journey in the mines are looking very much blood-stained, broken, and in dire need of care. You’ve taken to calling them Big Man and Small Boy because you don’t learn their names, you don’t learn where they’re from, and you don’t learn what they’re after, which is fine by you because—well—you have a feeling.

Yes, a feeling.

You’re not keen on moving past surface-level trivialities (it's one of the many benefits of being the inn-keeper's daughter); in fact, father moved far, far away from home for that very reason alone, hence the inn by mines somewhere even farther away than that. You live in the ether of here and now: you may learn a man’s eating habits in passing, but you’ll never learn what he likes to eat, what he likes to cook, and what he likes to indulge in when there comes time for indulgence and play. It’s one of the few joys of living here.

Among others, of course. Others, because this is the place where mother died--which means this is the place where father can keep her most sacred memories alive and well. As long as these mines exist, as long as you have yourself a home between the nestle of rocks, she can never truly go into the night.

And yet.

The markings on Big Man’s skin are hellacious and red—it’s screaming _look at me, fight me, kill me_. His skin is pale like a ghoul. He looks like a curse. A big giant curse. Big Man with a Big Curse and Big Secrets in Wait. The shoe fits because it starts snowing the moment he arrives at the inn--him, along with his son. Your father ushers them towards the barn, fits them in their sleeping cots, and tells you to keep a safe distance away.

You wonder who he is.

*

Small Boy beams when you arrive with their dinner at twilight. Two loaves of bread, oxtail stew, and boiled eggs. He drops whatever he’s doing -- stitching up the seams of his fighting tunic -- and leaps towards the food. He looks thin. Wiry. He looks like he hasn’t eaten well in days.

“Fhanks,” he says, in between bites, while his father looks on, disinterested.

Tired and worn, a reluctant traveler, yet a traveler nonetheless.

You stare at his skin under the glow of the fire and look away when he catches you. “I can help you fix that up,” you state, quietly, hoping to turn the subject. It’s no lie, anyway. You’ve always had a knack for domestic chores: cooking, cleaning, sewing. All the hallmarks of a worthy wife—and what are you if not waiting for the day to marry and become a wife worthy of marriage?

Small Boy looks to Big Man for permission. Big Man nods.

You take the tunic from the edge of the bed where it’s been discarded. Small Boy’s handiwork is pretty rough, but you’ve seen worse from grown men. You’d venture to say it’s rather decent, though it’s small praise for a boy who looks like he’s halfway down the path towards becoming a warrior, much like his father.

“Did your mother teach you?” You ask, motioning to the stitches. It elicits a pause from Small Boy, who looks at Big Man before turning back and nodding with a mouthful of bread.

"Sure did."

"She taught you well."

He smiles.

“I’ll return in the morning,” you tell them, holding the tunic in your hands, so small and inconsequential. “Rest well.”

*

You keep your promise and return with Small Boy’s tunic in the early morning, long before the sun rises, long before he’s truly awake. But Big Man is up, ruminating in meditation by the cliffs of the mine. He’s staring in the tresses and shadows, as if they’ll offer him some kind of answer to the unknown that he’s yet to discover.

“Are you hunting for treasure?” You ask, and though he acknowledges your presence with a _hum_ that sounds like a cross between a growl and genuine disinterest. You decide not to push it, though the answer seem clear as day. “There’s a back entrance behind those cliffs over there,” you tack on, placing the tunic on the path of grass between you two.

The story never changes: you offer the same advice, but none of them return the same, and if they do, never of sound mind.

“I’m afraid I should warn you, as is my duty as keeper of the mines,” you tell him. “I’ve seen better men try and fail.”

He pauses. Thinking.

“I am no better man.”

You laugh.

The sound alone surprises him, as if he’s hearing laughter for the very first time. “Something funny?”

“You just…sound so serious about it,” you reply. “So serious that I can’t take you seriously at all.”

“That makes no sense.”

You smile at him, “Some things don’t have to.”

For a while, it's silent between you.

Because you have a feeling.

And sometimes that feeling knows better than you do.

"If you should happen upon my mother's ring," you go on. "Down in those mines--I'll give you a reward when you return."

He glances at you, "I make you no promises, woman."

How very predictable, you think, studying him--studying those red markings, those tired eyes, and that tangled nest of a beard. "Then perhaps a pear?" You throw out, wondering if it'll stick. "It's the only fruit in Midgard I've yet to find."

He snorts, "There are no pears that grow in the shadows."

"...I know. It was a joke."

When you get up on your feet and offer him a hand, he takes it, though you feel no weight on the other hand. He does it as a courtesy, but the closest thing it comes to is a formality. He won’t depend on you, and that’s fine and well because you don’t have any plans of depending on him either.

He bends down and takes the tunic before meeting your gaze and offering a curt nod. It’s the closest thing you’ll get to thanks.

2.

The second time is pure coincidence.

They return from the mines, battered, bruised, and with empty hands. Father ushers them into the barn, which has remained empty since their last departure. You help them settle in, not without offering them baths, food, and a story, one that even Mimir hasn’t heard.

“There was once a girl who could see the burdens of any man with a touch,” you tell him. “His past, his present—all but his future. She could see every mistake, every agony, every joy and bereavement. Soon enough, those burdens became hers to carry, even as each man passed of old age—even as she lived to see many winters come after those men.”

Small Boy pauses, “That’s it?”

You nod.

“Jeez, your stories are almost as bad as father’s.”

“ _Boy_.”

You smile, “That’s because some endings have yet to be written—some stories are waiting for the end to come.”

“What does that mean?”

Mimir quirks a brow, “It means milady here has secrets of her own."

*

You learn a lot about people from their nighttime routines.

How they assimilate to strange new lands, what conditions they provide themselves with what little belongings they carry in their traveler packs, and the comforts they prefer before they unwind and let go into the night. Big Man, you learn, is a man of discipline and routine. He scrubs down in the baths, meditates by the candlelight, and settles in his cot the moment the sun descends.

Small Boy is not like his father.

He approaches you hours after midnight, ready to show you another tear in his tunic, this time by the armpit. “This is from no battle, sweet boy. This hole is from growing taller,” you tell him, smiling a wry little smile. “You’ll have to replace that tunic soon.”

“I know. Father said he'll do that next time we see Brok and Sindri.”

“And when would that be?”

“When we get—” He pauses, reconsidering his words. “What we’re looking for.”

You decide not to press it.

He doesn’t seem deterred, watching you work.

“Your tunic is in good hands,” you tell him, but his gaze stays fixed on your hands. “You should get some rest.”

He kicks his feet under the table, “I’m not tired.”

“I find that hard to believe. The mines are no easy resting place."

It’s the right thing to say because he immediately perks up. “We took down three ogres.” And that’s just the beginning of the list, as he goes on—draugrs, wolves, and seedy creatures of the night. They all fall the same--to battle axes, arrows, and chain blades made of fire and runes.

“You’re pretty strong for a kid,” you say, putting down the finishing touches on his tunic before passing it back. He takes it gingerly; he’s oddly delicate for a little boy, but you find it almost endearing. “Maybe I should hire you as my personal guard.”

“Our services don’t come cheap,” is his response, beaming bright. “I’m kidding.” And then he looks at you, carefully. “Why? You have an enemy you need defending from?”

You smile, wryly, “I wish I did.”

*

Small Boy falls asleep in your living space by the fire.

You make him a little cot and head to the barn, where you find Big Man wide awake, ruminating by the candlelight. He tends to do that a lot. Think. It gives him an adversely pained quality, as if whatever contemplation is worth more than the weight of the world, as if whatever thought he has is worth tenfold what his troubles are.

“Your boy fell asleep in the house,” you tell him, and it’s enough to make him sigh.

“He caused you trouble?”

“Not at all.”

It’s silent for a while.

“That story you told,” he starts, suddenly. “It was about you, was it not?”

You decide not to bullshit him with the petty small talk.

"It was."

"You can see someone's memories from one touch?"

"That would be the case," you reply. "Very unfortunate--I know."

He looks somewhat miffed, but that dissolves into something of understanding, then acceptance, as he lowers his gaze to the floor, “So you know who I am."

You wonder if you’re overstepping your boundaries when you take a seat on the cot next to him, but you decide to lay whatever apprehensions you have to rest when you see he’s yet to protest your being there.

“I know only what you want me to know.” You look at him earnestly, with a piercing stare that automatically belies all your sincerity. “If you want me to know nothing, then I will know nothing. If you want me to know something, then I will know something. And if all you want me to know is your name, then that is all I will carry with me.”

He pauses again, thinking it over before offering you his hand.

You take it.

And then you see.

 _His name is Kratos_.

And you can feel every scar.

But that's it--just as fast as it comes, it stops. You don't go past further than his name. You stop where his permissions end.

And then.

Slowly, you crawl into his lap, touching his face. Hardened like leather. He doesn’t make any motion to halt you, as you trace your fingertips against the red lines, his ghostly skin.

You lean over and sink your teeth into his shoulder, which elicits nothing more than hiss of surprise. You suck on his skin, tongue lathering up his neck until you reach the back of his earlobe. He lets you play your little games, content to keep his hands restrained until you reach the soft spot behind his ear. You suck until you leave a bruise, and when you pull back, you watch the purple mark strain—

It turns green, yellow—and just like that, it’s gone.

“Does it hurt?” You ask, quietly, running your fingers down where the mark should’ve been.

He doesn’t touch you. Doesn’t make a move to stop you either.

You wonder if he finds you revolting.

“No.”

He takes your hand and presses it against his chest, where you feel the beat of his heart.

"You're a strange woman," he says.

"Why do you say that?"

He doesn't answer, as he presses his palm against your chest, where he can feel your heart beat. "You know what I am and you don't care," he says, and once the words punch the air, you know it's true.

"I know what you want me to know--that's all."

And then you see it.

The faintest curl of a smile on his face.

It goes just as fast as it comes--so fast, in fact, that you're left wondering if it were really there at all.

3.

The third is a coincidence, as he returns from the mines for the very last time.

He offers you a pouch of silvers, more than what father asked. You’re about to point it out, but he folds your tiny, ineffectual hands over the pouch and stops you. “The extra is yours,” he states, voice a dull hum, and you think you might like the sound of it. “Not your father’s.”

His hand lingers a moment longer, but you’re already wishing it would stay.

“Will I see you again?” You ask.

He pauses.

“Unlikely.”

He lets go of your hands, turning towards the doorway, but stops as Mimir, still strung up on his waist, bids you farewell. He waits for you to bid farewell too, but you don’t.

“This isn’t goodbye,” he states, and for whatever reason, it actually inspires belief.

From both of you.

4.

The fourth is a time of reckoning.

Father’s inn is under renovations—it comes equipped with a new tavern and a new barn. The travelers that come to and from your doors are mostly homeward bound. The mines are just a passageway to their final destination, which is fine because there’s not much left of them since Kratos and Atreus passed through months earlier.

“It’s time for you to marry, sweet daughter of mine,” father tells you one day, and you know this to be the singular truth of your realm: marry a kind man, bear his children, and live out the rest of your days quietly, perhaps on a farm, or in one of the surviving city-states that haven’t been drowned in the rising seas.

Suitors from far, far away begin lining up for your marriage hand, each one woefully more underwhelming than the next. Some are stupid men, some are wicked men, and some are terribly, terribly boring men, which may be the least offensive of the bunch. Father tells you to find someone easy—someone malleable, so you can live out the rest of your days contented and full of cheer. You don’t tell him how much you hate how this is his version of cheer, not yours.

And yet you have your duties to uphold. You can’t possibly live with father forever, nor can you work alone as an inn mistress when he passes. Father has the right idea, but the right idea angers you, even if it is in good faith.

So steeped into your own contemplation you are that you don’t notice two familiar faces manifesting in the distance from the long road down.

Atreus is the first to greet you, plopping down before you on the grass. “Hey! It’s been a while.” He’s beaming bright, so bright in fact that all your worries and apprehensions vanish for a moment and you’re wondering what you were thinking about in the first place.

Mimir meets your gaze from the belt of Kratos’ hip, “Good to see you well, milady.”

“Well look at that,” you return his smile. “What brings you here?”

Kratos betrays nothing with that look of apathy, so chilling and cold you would’ve taken it for indifference and hate had you not known any better. “We require passage through the mines. That’s all,” he says, but you wonder if that’s true—and from the grins exchanged between Mimir and Atreus, you’d venture to say that was a lie.

But you don't dwell.

It's easier to take things at face value because it requires no effort at all, no effort worth consuming anyway. None of them question your silence; none of them even sense you're spinning off the axel--none of them, except Kratos, who just stares at you like he's staring at you for the very last time.

"Whoa, this place is huge now," says Atreus, passing through the doorway into the tavern.

Kratos pauses, gazing into the burning embers and the kegs of ale, "You used the silvers to renovate?"

You nod.

"I said it was for you, not your father."

You close the door behind them, "This is for me." You smile, congenially, though it belies something of hurt, maybe restraint too. "What my father wants is what I want too."

*

It's bustling.

You study each one of the men inside with an eagle’s eye. Some of them come alone, some of them come with their mistresses, and some of them come with an entire hunting party, though one has to wonder what there is to hunt in the mines besides wolves and draugrs.

The irony is you might find yourself tethered to one of them one day—one day and forevermore—and apparently one of them senses your weakness to this sentiment, as he rounds the table and meets you by the fire.

“Milady’s face looks mighty tired,” he says, gulping down his ale. His breath smells sour, like yeast.

You smile at him in a loving, chagrined way, “Milady’s face betrays something more sinister than tiredness, traveler.” Amazing how he has the audacity to speak to how you feel as if he’s attuned to your every waking thought.

“And what would that be?”

“Annoyance.”

“With?”

“You.”

He looks offended. You feel inspired.

Next thing you know, his hand whips across your face and the entire tavern falls silent. Your father rounds the table, dropping his jug of sweet ale to the floor before lunging towards the man, but he slaps your father away to the wall before he even gets the chance.

"Don't touch her!" Atreus jumps from his seat, but his father stops him, as he stands from his table, the legs of his bench screeching against the floor.

Every eye stays locked on him as he makes his way over, grabbing the stranger by the tresses of his long, golden hair. "We got a tough guy over here, huh," says the stranger, grinning that drunkard smile with a broken snaggle tooth that probably means he's been in a situation very similar to this before.

Kratos pauses.

Next thing you know the stranger’s body goes barreling out the front door like a ragdoll—no, a sack of garbage is more apt, and you’re left thinking the cut on your cheek is probably worth it.

*

“Stop. Wriggling. Woman.”

You try not to wince as the needle pierces through your cheek—in and out, out and in, until the suture is complete.

“You’ll leave a scar.”

Mimir looks on incredulously, “Who would’ve thought those two giant hands could be so delicate?”

Funny enough, you were thinking the same thing, watching as Kratos sets down his needle and thread by the candlelight while Atreus brings you a rag and and basin of ice water. “Your father’s asleep,” he says, smiling. “Won’t feel a thing when he wakes up tomorrow.” No doubt thanks to some runes he’s dug up from the bottom of his traveling pack.

“Thank you,” you whisper, feeling oddly ashamed.

Kratos, however, seems to notice your hesitancy. He hands Atreus the head, “Boy. Gather some chamomile from the garden.” He doesn’t have to ask twice because Atreus immediately bounds off towards the main house, Mimir in tow.

“You’re quiet,” he says, once the boy is gone.

“Am I?”

"Don't throw the question back at me, woman."

You sigh, "I'm fine."

“You lie."

You pause, looking out the window, “So what if I am? People say things they don’t mean all the time.”

He considers it for a while, “That is true.”

It’s probably the one thing you two have found common ground over, as you gaze at the stitches in your tiny little hand mirror.

“What…ails you?”

It looks like it’s taken an immense amount of effort to even get the question out, and though you’re in no mood to humor him, you decide to answer earnestly instead. He seems like an earnest man, single-minded and pure in a way that most of men you’ve met aren’t. The giant hulking body would've probably told you otherwise, though.

“My father intends to marry me,” you explain. “Once he finds a man who’s wealthy enough to pay the dowry.”

“And is that what you want?”

“It is.”

"You lie again."

You don't fight him this time.

“So what do you want?”

Another question as old as time and yet the answers seldom matter.

“I want to get married, of course. I want father to find me a kind man. And I want to carry that kind man's children, and live out the rest of my days in peace and quiet.”

Kratos pauses.

“You lie.”

You smile, wryly.

“I want my father to live an easy life,” you explain. “He took care of me after mother died. I think he sees this as a way to pass me off to someone else who's also capable enough to take care of me—because when he grows old, he won’t be able to."

It's the truth.

And both of you know it.

He touches the stitch on your cheek—gentle and slow, as he meets your gaze. Something flutters in your stomach when you see how deeply he looks into your eyes, how much he’s drinking in that look of anticipation on your face. But he doesn’t kiss you, nor does he make another move to touch you.

So you decide to do it first.

You take his hand, so large and calloused, and press a kiss to his knuckles before laying down on his sleeping cot and bunching up your dress to your wiast.

“What’re you doing, woman.”

You blink at him, “You don’t—want this?”

“Do not tempt me.”

But you’re pleading, parting your lips to take his middle finger in your mouth. Tongue lathering down every callous, every scar, every old blister scarred twice over before guiding it towards the hem of your dress.

“Careful now.” His voice throbs at a dull hum. “If you don’t stop—"

You shove aside your underdress and his finger slides right between your folds, already wet and slicked up with arousal. You arch your back, feeling him curl inside you, filling you so full you can’t help but moan. You want this—you think—you want every moment of this, you want every nerve caught on fire, you want every passing pleasure you can get before it becomes a memory neverlasting.

He brings up his other hand, thumb finding the peak between your folds as he keeps his finger curled inside you—as you bury your face into the blankets and let him take over until you’re climaxing into his palm and he’s letting you ride out your orgasm on his fingers and you’re curling in the afterglow of white hot adrenaline and blood rushing to your face.

He unfingers himself from inside you, licking off your slick with that look of apathy like he couldn’t care less.

It takes you a moment to gather yourself, as you get up and reach for his belt, but he stops you.

“You won’t let me pleasure you?” You ask, but he just brushes your hair behind your ear.

“Come with me.”

*

Kratos takes you out into the fields and recites the constellations to you—most of them he knows by heart. You don’t ask him how he knows or even when he’s learned, but when he stops, steeped into the silence of just being in your presence, you realize somewhere between the stars, that’s where his home is.

At some point, Atreus and Mimir join you with three cups of chamomile tea and the four of you watch the sky as it lights up and the sun peeks over the horizon.

And it's time for them to leave again.

“We’ll be back,” Atreus says, grinning. “After we—"

“ _Boy_.”

“Be well,” you say, offering him a pinky finger. “Return safe and sound, alright?”

“Count on it,” is his response, as he links pinkies with you.

They leave in the morning, but you’re left thinking about them the rest of the week.

4.

He brings you a pear the fourth time.

It’s not a coincidence, it’s resolute. But you’re staring at the pear because you’ve never had a pear before—because you’ve only ever seen them in pictures of a time lost, in old texts, in old scriptures from old ruins. Because a pear has all but become a fantasy for you, the same way gods and demigods have become fantasies for father too.

And because it'd been a joke, albeit somewhat of an unfunny one.

Kratos leaves the pear on your sleeping cot by your nightstand. “Take the head,” he says, and you do, holding Mimir close to your chest. “The boy and I will be back by sunrise.”

“Where are you going?”

Atreus smiles, “Back to the mines.”

“I thought you got what you needed already.”

“Well, we—”

“ _Boy_.”

He just beams before waving and taking off.

*

It’s a nice pear.

The kind of pear that fits well enough into your palm, but what does it really mean? _Is it just a pear or is it more than a pear?_ So deep into your own contemplation that you don’t even realize you’re asking these questions out loud.

Mimir pauses, “I reckon he’s trying to court you, milady.”

You blink.

“Oh. _Oh_.”

“Oh, indeed.”

*

He returns quietly in the night, making his way to your sleeping cot where he finds you and the pear bathing underneath the moonlight.

“You didn’t eat.”

You take the pear and place it in your lap. “I was thinking we could share it.” At this, you uncloak a small cutting knife from the pocket of your apron.

“It was a gift.”

“I’ve decided to share my gift.”

He pauses before taking a seat next to you.

“I want to know your story, woman."

Ah, hence the pear. He must've thought this was some kind of fair exchange.

“Only if you tell me yours.”

He offers you his hand.

“I’ll show you.”

You take it.

*

You feel every agony.

Every scar.

Every lost memory of a time past.

*

And so you weep—you weep all your tears and the tears he can’t offer.

You don’t tell him your story yet, but that’s OK. He has all the time to learn your depths and intricacies the next time he returns, whenever that’ll be. He doesn’t kiss you either—just brushes his fingers against your cheek and asks if your scar still hurts.

You lean into his palm, so whole and encompassing that you can fit half your face into it.

“It doesn’t,” you murmur.

He brushes a lock of hair behind your ear and cups your face with his hands, “Next time we meet, things will be different."

“What does that mean?"

“It means things will change for you soon.”

You believe him.

5.

The fifth time is the beginning of the end, but the truth is, the end begins long before that—it begins when Kratos arrives at the inn for the very first time; and this is when the inn was still just an inn, and there was no tavern, no loudmouths, no traveling parties. Just a barn and a girl and a story.

It begins when he lays eyes on you for the very first time, when he sees you smiling at the boy, smiling at Mimir, asking no questions and knowing all the answers nonetheless—it begins when he catches you stitching up that tunic in the middle of the night, gracing it with the protective enchantments you know so well from your mother—to protect from rips and to protect from monsters and other evils of the night.

It begins when he catches you praying to gods you don’t know by name, when he sees that you’re acting completely none-the-wiser in the morning.

It begins when you tell him about the pear, a neat little trinket he carries in his back pocket—and it begins when you tell the boy the story of _the girl_ —that girl— _you_.

It begins with many things, but mostly, it begins with you.

Kratos hands over a pouch of gold coins to your father.

“Is that enough?”

But your father just blinks at it, “More than enough for a night, good sir."

“I mean for your daughter’s hand in marriage.”

A pause.

“My daughter is worth more than a sack of gold,” he says. “I care not for how much you offer on the dowry—only that your character is true and your mind is sound.”

Kratos pauses.

“Your daughter would carry the weight of your casket for the rest of her life if it meant you were living in comfort.”

*

It’s the end but you don’t even know it.

But the beginning starts when Kratos brings you to the fields of grass, where the stars are beaming, where you’re making flower crowns with Atreus and Mimir, where you’re reciting the same constellations he recited to you once upon a time. You’re reciting them like they’re _your_ constellations, like they’re your stories, which they might as well be.

You lived them the moment you touched him.

He joins you, listening to the timbre of your voice—soft and tender, like you’re telling them secrets no one else knows, and it isn’t until Atreus is asleep that you acknowledge him with a smile. “Have a nice talk with father?” You ask, and it’s enough to make Kratos pause, as he reaches into his knapsack and procures a ring.

Not just any ring, though.

Your mother’s old ring.

“But—where—”

He puts it into your palm and covers your hand over it.

“You went all the way down,” you say, quietly—and you can see the flashes of his time down there in the darkness. All the draugrs and ogres and—look at that—a dragon too. “Why?"

“I want to marry you,” he says. “If you’ll have me.”

You smile.

“I think I already do."

He pulls you in, pressing his lips against yours--and you can feel the bushiness of his beard prickle against your skin, but you don't mind so much this time around. You think might even like it, but you'll learn that on your own time. Because when he asked you what you really wanted, this was it.

You wanted him.

**Author's Note:**

> i've mainly been focusing on my manuscript so my writing has been sooooooo rusty...... but it's nice to get back into the groove!!
> 
> anyway im on [twitter](https://twitter.com/wanderlu5tt) if u wanna talk about sexii kratos


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